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«How can one plan anything with Opo
«Leave that to Dujek.» She studied his face. «Do you have difficulty with any of these instructions?»
Tayschre
Lorn nodded. «Good. Now, I need a mundane healer and quarters.»
«Of course.» Tayschre
«Adjunct, I am glad you're here.»
«Thank you, High Mage.» After he left, Lorn sank into her chair and her mind travelled back nine years, to the sights and sounds experienced by a child, to a night, one particular night in the Mouse, when every nightmare a young girl's imagination could hold became real. She remembered blood, blood everywhere, and the empty faces of her mother, her father and older brother-faces numbed by the realization that they'd been spared, that the blood wasn't their own. As the memories stalked once again through her mind, a name rode the winds, rustling in the air as if clawing through dead branches. Lorn's lips parted, and she whispered, «Tattersail.»
The sorceress had found the strength to leave her bed. She now stood at the window, leaning with one hand against the frame for support, and looked down on a street crowded with military wagons. The systematic plunder that quartermasters called «resupply» was well under way. The eviction of nobility and gentry from their familial estates for the stationing of the officer corps, of which she was one, had ended days ago, while the repairing of the outer walls, the refitting of sundered gates, and the clearing of «Moon rain» continued apace.
She was glad she'd missed the river of corpses that must have filled the city streets during the initial phase of clean-up-wagon after wagon groaning beneath the weight of crushed bodies, white flesh seared by fire and slashed by sword, rat-gnawed and raven-pecked-men, women, and children. It was a scene she had witnessed before, and she had no wish ever to see it again.
Now, shock and terror had seeped down and out of sight. Scenes of normality reappeared as farmers and merchants emerged from hiding to meet the needs of occupiers and occupied alike. Malazan healers had swept the city, rooting out the birthing of plague and treating common ailments among all those they touched. No citizen would have been turned from their path. And sentiments began the long, perfectly pla
Soon, Tattersail knew, there'd be the culling of the nobility, a scourge that would raise to the gallows the greediest, least-liked nobles. And the executions would be public. A tried and true procedure that swelled recruitment on a tide of base vengeance-with every hand stained by a righteous glee. A sword in such hands completed the conspiracy and included all players in the hunt for the next victim to the cause-the Empire's cause.
She'd seen it run its course in a hundred such cities. No matter how benign the original rulers, no matter how generous the nobility, the word of Empire, weighted by might, twisted the past into a tyra
In her mind returned the faces of the Bridgeburners, a strange counterpoint to the cynicism with which she viewed all around her.
Whiskeyjack, a man pushed to the edge, or, rather, the edge creeping on him on all sides, a crumbling of beliefs, a failing of faiths, leaving as his last claim to humanity his squad, a shrinking handful of the only people that mattered any more. But he held on, and he pushed back-pushed back hard. She liked to think-no, she wanted to believe-he would win out in the end, that he'd live to see his world stripped of the Empire.
Quick Ben and Kalam, seeking to take the responsibility from their sergeant's shoulders. It was their only means of loving the man, though they'd never put it in such terms. In the others, barring Sorry, she saw the same, yet with them there was a desperation that she found endearing, a child-like yearning to relieve Whiskeyjack of everything their grim place had laid upon him.
She responded to them in a way deeper than she'd thought possible, from a core she'd long been convinced was burned out, the ashes scattered in silent lament-a core no mage could afford. Tattersail recognized the danger, but that only made it all the more alluring.
Sorry was another matter, and she found herself avoiding even thinking about that young woman.
And that left Paran. What to do about this captain? At the moment the man was in the room, seated on the bed behind her and oiling his sword, Chance. They'd not spoken much since she'd awakened four days ago.
There was still too much distrust.
Perhaps it was that mystery, that uncertainty, that made them so attracted to one another. And the attraction was obvious: even now, with her back to the man, she sensed a taut thread between them. Whatever energy burned between them, it felt dangerous. Which made it exciting.
Tattersail sighed. Hairlock had appeared this very morning, eager and agitated about something. The puppet would not answer their queries, but the sorceress suspected that Hairlock had found a trail, and it seemed it might take the puppet out of Pale and on to Darujhistan.
That was not a happy thought.
She stiffened as the ward she'd placed outside her door was tripped.
Tattersail whirled to Paran. «A visitor,» she said.
He rose, Chance in his hands.
The sorceress waved her hand over him. «You're no longer visible, Captain. Nor can anyone sense your presence. Make no sound, and wait here.» She strode into the outer room just as a soft knock sounded on the door.
She opened it to see a young marine standing in the hallway. «What is it?» she demanded.
The marine bowed. «High Fist Dujek is inquiring as to your health, Sorceress.»
«Much better,» she said. «That's kind of him. Now, if you'll-»
The marine interrupted diffidently. «If you answered as you just have, I am to convey the High Fist's request that you attend a formal supper this evening in the main building.»
Tattersail cursed silently. She shouldn't have told the truth. Now, it was too late. A «request» from her commander was not something that could be denied. «Inform the High Fist that I will be honoured to share his company over supper.» A thought struck her. «May I ask who else will be present?»
«High Mage Tayschre
«Adjunct Lorn is here?»
«Arrived this morning, Sorceress.»
Oh, Hood's Breath. «Convey my reply,» Tattersail said, struggling against a rising tide of fear. She shut the door, then heard the marine's boots hurrying down the hallway.
«What's wrong?» Paran asked, from the opposite doorway.
She faced him. «Put that sword away, Captain.» She walked over to the dresser and began rummaging through the drawers. «I'm to attend a di
Paran approached. «An official gathering.»
Tattersail nodded distractedly. «With Adjunct Lorn there as well, as if Tayschre
The Captain murmured, «So she's finally arrived.»
Tattersail froze. She turned to him slowly. «You've been expecting her, haven't you?»
Paran started and looked at her with frightened eyes.
She realized his mumbling hadn't been meant for her ears. «Dammit,» she hissed. «You're working for her!»
The captain's answer was clear as he spun round. She watched him vanish into the bedroom, her thoughts a storm of fury. The threads of conspiracy now thrummed in her mind. So, Quick Ben's suspicions had been accurate: a plan was afoot to kill the squad. Did that make her life at risk as well? She felt herself nearing a decision. What that decision was she wasn't sure, but there was a direction to her thoughts now, and it had the inevitable momentum of an avalanche.
The seventh bell was ringing from some distant tower as Toc the Younger passed into the Empire headquarters.